Issues of concern to people who live in the west: property rights, water rights, endangered species, livestock grazing, energy production, wilderness and western agriculture. Plus a few items on western history, western literature and the sport of rodeo... Frank DuBois served as the NM Secretary of Agriculture from 1988 to 2003. DuBois is a former legislative assistant to a U.S. Senator, a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Interior, and is the founder of the DuBois Rodeo Scholarship.

Tuesday, July 02, 2013

Feds Approve Huge Wind Facility Near Lake Mead

Interior Secretary Sally Jewell has signed
off on a wind power facility that would cover almost 60 square miles of
public lands in Arizona near the Lake Mead National Recreation Area. The
Mohave County Wind Farm, built by BP Wind Energy North America, would
include up to 243 wind turbines with blades about 180 feet long. The project would occupy 35,329 acres of land
under the Bureau of Land Management and 2,781 acres of Bureau of
Reclamation land, and would butt up against Lake Mead NRA about 44 miles
east of Las Vegas. Depending on the transmission connection eventually
chosen, the project would max out at between 425 and 500 megawatts peak
generating capacity. According to the Interior Department, the design of the Mohave County
Wind Farm was altered significantly due to the presence of eagle nesting
areas on nearby Squaw Peak, to the east of the main road leading to the
popular Temple Bar Marina on Lake Mead. As a concession to the eagles
the redrawn plan includes a nesting zone buffer area at least 1.2 miles
wide, a distance it would take an adult eagle at least one minute and 48
seconds to traverse at a typical unhurried soaring speed of 30 miles
per hour or so...more